du_falloutfandomcom-20200216-history
Summary of merge forum
General principles * Brush up on formatting styles by consulting the editing guidelines. It’s a brief document that touches on many of the fundamentals and is the standard we apply to the content. * Assume good faith. If someone drops a paragraph or edits a sentence incorrectly, it’s not evidence a grand conspiracy, but just human error. In these cases, just correct it or add information you believe was omitted, and maybe give the editor in question a heads-up. ** Be civil and courteous when talking to other editors. Profanity, aggression, and other intimidating behavior have no place on the wiki, regardless of the user’s standing or edit count. * Get involved! The best way to ensure the merge between the wikis is a successful one is active editing or otherwise supporting active editors with positivity and feedback. Communication channels * We have been using a dedicated chatroom on the Nukapedia’s Fallout Shelter Discord server, freely available to all thus far. #merger-workspace and #editorial-bullpen are two of the primary means of communication, clarification, coordination, and other affairs related to the merge. ** If you need something urgently or just want to highlight a discussion, ping @tagaziel#8836 or other users with editing experience (see Fallout Wiki:Administrators and moderators). * Use article talk pages as well to highlight potential improvements or content accidentally omitted during the merge. For clarity, make sure to explain the proposal in a bit of detail, so that a decision can be reached with due speed and attention Things to watch out for * When working with content from The Vault, whether merging or proofreading, be sure to: ** Ensure consistent decapitalization, especially with note and holotape names. This goes double for references. *** In some cases, decapitalization is a judgment call, especially with some location places (e.g. Tygart Water Treatment Plant and Tygart water treatment plant; this depends on whether the editor considers it a proper noun or not). In doubt, go with what the name is on Fandom. ** Tagaziel will run a bot to replace “terminals” with “terminal entries” at regular basis. The bot is dumb, though, so it might skip the odd link. If this is the case, update the link. ** Some notes exist in multiple parts (eg. scattered journal pages). If a redlink exists to one part, update it with a redirect to the collected pages or to link to the collected pages. Procedurals The exciting part begins here! This section is intended as a general guideline for the merger past this point. Merging basics The key consideration here is quality. As The Dyre Wolf noted in the forum, valuable information should not be lost in the merger for any reason. When deciding what to merge, you can use the following checklist as reference: # Check whether the article exists on both sides. If it’s missing on Fandom, import it, otherwise: # Read the content of the Nukapedia page that will be merged. # Check which article covers the series up to Fallout 76. # Check whether the article is referenced (according to the referencing guidelines). # Check whether a page is entirely rewritten on The Vault, saving the time when overhauling the page on Nukapedia. # Mark the page as merged on the merger page; a second user can then proofread the ported content. # Leave a summary comment when saving a merged page; also when proofreading the content. If an article is missing, it can be ported over directly, proofreading it so that it conforms to the current standards. Otherwise, a merge is necessary. In general, it should be possible to build around existing content (see Sierra Madre vending machine, where the existing background content has been expanded with Vault's references and content), adding new content cumulatively. If it's impossible, make the necessary edits. Conflicts between users on a merged page should be discussed between each other to come to an agreement, with possible request of intervention by a third party. If Nukapedia and The Vault content is considered equal of quality, the better referenced article trumps the less referenced one. When articles are without references, the Nukapedia content is preferred when the content is of equal quality. Speculation In case a claim is uncertain and could constitute speculation (eg. that the Brotherhood attacked Redding to destroy NCR's gold reserves), follow the following checklist: #Is there a reference for the claim? #Does the reference support the claim? #Is the reference contradicted by other references? #Are any assumptions necessary to accept the claim? Keep an open mind here. For example, while a great many fans assume power armor is tank-like or was meant to replace tanks, this is not reflected by any sort of source, barring an ambiguous statement in the Fallout Bible which is hyperbolic (like the Fallout 2 intro and its imaginative claim of continents falling beneath boiling oceans). The same goes for any advanced power armor lore or claims it was invented purely by the Enclave (which are not backed by any sources in the games; the only lore on that subject is a half-sentence in the not so reliable Fallout 2 Official Strategies and Secrets). Importing features The Vault has added several features that rely heavily on MediaWiki code and templates. If you plan on importing them, make sure to update the template documentation to help other users figure out how the template works and how to keep it updated. If a user updates the template, but forgets about the documentation, politely remind them of it (reverse-engineering them is an issue). Note that in some cases, the functionality of the template has been already replicated by hand. In these cases, discussing how to proceed with other users is recommended. General improvements Other improvements that can be imported include: * Grouping references as on the power armor and Sino-American War page, to establish a more granular referencing system (i.e. what comes from released games and what from non-game sources). * Separating notable loot by type as on eg. Camp Venture, to aid navigation. * Layout improvements will be suggested by The Vault in the time to come, they will be discussed with the community.